The House of Representatives was set to vote Tuesday on a tough sanctions bill on North Korea in what would be the first tangible action taken in the U.S. to punish the communist nation for its fourth nuclear test. 

The office of Rep. Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who is also the main sponsor of the legislation, H.R. 757, said in a release Monday night that the House is expected to vote on the bill on Tuesday.

The legislation was introduced by Royce and dozens of other House members in February last year in response to the North's hacking attack on Sony Pictures in late 2014. It passed through the Foreign Affairs Committee later that month, but has since been dormant. 

Calls for its passage gained significant traction after the North's nuclear test last Wednesday, with House Speaker Paul Ryan promising to put the bill to a vote, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi pledging "strong bipartisan support" for it.

"Last week, North Korea conducted its fourth known nuclear test. The Kim regime has developed increasingly destructive weapons: miniaturized nuclear warheads that fit onto its most reliable missiles, and submarines capable of launching those devices. We cannot stand by and allow North Korea to continue to build an arsenal capable of striking the U.S.," Royce said during a House session Monday.

Royce called the bill "the most comprehensive North Korea sanctions legislation" that "uses targeted financial and economic pressure to isolate Kim Jong-un and his top officials from the assets they maintain in foreign banks, and from the hard currency that sustains their rule."

Such assets are derived in part from illicit activities, such as counterfeiting U.S. currency and selling weapons around the world, and are used to advance the North's nuclear program and "pay for the luxurious lifestyle of the ruling elites, and the continued repression of the North Korean people," Royce said.

Royce likened the bill to the 2005 U.S. blacklisting of a Macau bank, which almost cut off the North from the international financial system. The measure not only froze North Korean money in the bank but also scared away other financial institutions from dealing with Pyongyang for fear they would also be blacklisted. 

It is considered the most effective U.S. sanction yet on the North.

"At that time, according to one former top U.S. official, 'every conversation (with the North Koreans) began and ended with the same question: 'When do we get our money back?'" Royce said.

"But this pressure was lifted, prematurely, after Kim Jong-il offered to make concessions on its nuclear program -- concessions that, ultimately, he never followed through with. What a mistake."

Royce accused President Barack Obama of failing to get tough on the North.

"The Obama Administration's policy of 'strategic patience' has failed. A year ago, it promised a 'proportional response' to the massive cyberterrorist attack against the United States. But to date, the Administration's response has been dangerously weak," he said, adding only 18 low-level arms dealers have been sanctions so far.

"Failing to respond to North Korea's belligerence only emboldens the Kim regime," he said.

Royce also said that the U.S. should go after the North's illicit activities just as it goes after organized crime by identifying the network, interdicting shipments, and disrupting the flow of money. 

"North Korea, after all, has been called a 'Gangster Regime.'

Well, this regime is a critical threat to our national security.

Under this bill's framework, anyone laundering money, counterfeiting goods, smuggling, or trafficking narcotics will be subject to significant sanctions," he said.

"A return to the strategy of effective financial pressure on North Korea is our best bet to end North Korea's threat to our South Korean allies, and ultimately, to the American people," he said. (Yonhap)